Editorials

January 07, 1999

JOINT PLANNING

Newport News and Hampton should plan as one community

Two separate planning processes are setting the stage for future development in Newport News and Hampton. This is good and needed work that will identify each city's future sites for public buildings, areas for business and industrial development and sections to be preserved for residential uses, among other things.

But when it's done, the work of these separate planners should be the launching pad for a giant step in cooperation between the two cities: a joint working committee on collaboration.

Newport News and Hampton are unusually close neighbors because there's no county to provide a buffer between these two urban centers. And the lives of their residents are thoroughly intertwined by jobs, shopping, recreation, family, friends and religious life.

On a daily basis, it is probably only the employees of the cities who always think in terms of "their" city. It is unfortunate that they so seldom think of the two cities as one community.

But that is what's needed to plan and build a cooperative, efficient future. Once the two cities complete their individual planning processes, they should convene a new joint commission to take the same approach for the two cities together.

To create the joint commission, choose from those citizens who have worked on the separate plans already. Look at the cities' needs. Can fire stations, police storefronts, recreation facilities and branch libraries be located to serve both and avoid duplication? Can the two agree on zoning for communities that cross the city boundaries? Can they select industrial sites to complement, rather than compete with, one another?

Someone on one of the two cities' planning commissions occasionally asks how the other city handles a new problem. The two commissions occasionally meet to discuss these kinds of issues. That's good, but it's time for a bolder step.

Plan together to make Newport News and Hampton operate more like what their residents know them to be - a single community.

EARLY RETIREMENT

Plan at odds with today's pattern of living, working longer

Gov. Jim Gilmore wants to allow state employees to retire with full benefits after 30 years of service, regardless of age. There are two major flaws in his plan.

First, people are living longer, staying healthy longer and working longer. This has been acknowledged by the federal government's decision to begin upping the age at which workers can begin collecting Social Security. And a similar plan is being discussed for Medicare.

It simply goes against the current experience to allow people to retire earlier. An employee who began working after high school graduation at age 18 could retire at age 48 under Gilmore's plan and have a good chance of collecting retirement benefits for more years than he or she worked. Yet few people would actually retire permanently. Instead, they would collect retirement benefits from the state while working another job. Better to keep them - and just as important - their years of experience on the state payroll.

Second, the state and local governments in Virginia have had dreadful experiences with early retirements. Twice in this decade government employees have been encouraged to leave early, first to save money during the recession and later to downsize government. But there have been no demonstrable savings. Instead, the "retired" employees returned to their old jobs as consultants with the same duties and less oversight, and some of the best public employees were driven in their own best interest to private jobs.

State employees suffered in an unfriendly workplace during George Allen's administration, and it is not surprising that his successor wants to atone. But this is not the answer.

MILITARY SPENDING

Armed services need funding for overworked peacekeepers

U.S. defense spending will have to go up. The quarrel will be how much.

President Clinton on Saturday proposed a $12 billion increase in the upcoming fiscal year and $110 billion spread over six years. Sen. John Warner, new chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, says $17.5 billion and $148 billion are more like it.

The military's needs are urgent. Punishing Saddam Hussein and Iraq for making mischief with deadly weapons is expensive. The meter is also running to keep soldiers as part of an international force to deter Serbia from slaughtering ethnic neighbors.

Meanwhile, weary and highly skilled personnel like Air Force and Navy pilots are being picked off for high-paying work as commercial pilots. The Navy, according to Warner, is 7,000 sailors short.

The Clinton plan is largely for a pay raise, the largest since 1982. Americans don't sign up for the military to get rich. They do deserve respectable pay and quarters for the draining and often dangerous work they are required to do.

Military spending this decade has been flat, with the exception of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, when spending increases exceeded the rate of inflation. Now and early in the next century America must invest in its military. But this nation must do it sensibly. That means not wasting dollars on equipment or programs the armed forces didn't ask for or won't need for battle readiness, but merely pander to an influential congressman or senator. The case must stand on its merits, not on self-interest.